A New Age of Peace

In his book 'Peace Is the Way' Deepak Chopra explains how a global shift in consciousness will bring an end to war.

The title for Deepak Chopra's latest book was inspired by a quote from Mahatma Gandhi: "There is no way to peace. Peace is the way." Chopra, the author of more than 40 books on spirituality and health, believes world peace will be achieved when enough individuals decide to make peace a part of their spiritual practice. The mission for Chopra's Alliance for the New Humanity, launched in December of 2003, is to create a "global community of peacemakers" and counts among its supporters many prominent business leaders, spiritual thinkers, celebrities, and artists. We spoke with the author about his hopes for peace in a "New Age."

You write that we are on the verge of a global shift in consciousness that will lead the world toward peace. One indicator you cite is that one third to one half of Americans accept some form of New Age values. What are New Age values?

Well, evolution is a process in the universe that is ongoing; otherwise, our children wouldn't be smarter than us, which they are-and there wouldn't be any progress in the world. So the universe is constantly moving in the direction of higher evolutionary impulses, creativity, abstraction, and meaning. Conscious evolution is the ability of human beings to consciously participate in that process; we are a species that is conscious of our consciousness. We can actually accelerate the process through meditation, through the ability to find stillness through loving actions, through compassion and sharing, through understanding the nature of the creative process in the universe and having a sense of connection to it. So that's conscious evolution.

There's been a lot of talk about the influence of conservative values after the presidential election. Do you believe that this New Age movement is a sort of silent majority?

I hope so. If it's not, it will be soon. You need a critical mass of connectivity for that to happen. So it could be a majority but unless you get to that critical mass of connectivity, it may not really take that jump.

Americans have just re-elected a president who took the country to war. What signs do you see that make you hopeful the world is moving toward peace?

Well, first of all, whenever there is a faith transition in society, the forces of inertia and resistance also come forth as we rise in consciousness; our shadow also rises to meet the challenge. So I would say, just like water boils into steam, we have the same thing happening. There's a lot of turbulence. I would interpret this turbulence and the actions of our president, and [the] fear of our collective psyche as part of the transition. We're seeing the dying carcass of the old paradigm.

At the same time that we are seeing the rise of alternative and New Age spirituality, we are witnessing a surge in religious fundamentalism. How would you convince the fundamentalists to join this New Age movement toward peace?

You can't convince anybody. You know, what happens is consciousness operates in mysterious ways. One of those ways is that the old paradigm suddenly starts to die. Just like when the Berlin Wall fell: it reached a critical mass of collective consciousness that [removing it] was no longer a terrible idea. And boom, it happened, and that's the way this will happen. You cannot convince somebody against their will-what's the expression? "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still."

So you believe there will be enough people moving toward peace to render the fundamentalists irrelevant, that the movement will reach critical mass without them?

Yes, and this type of fundamentalism is also an expression of deep insecurity and fear.

You write that the world peace movement must start with a spiritual transformation at the level of each individual. How would this type of personal transformation lead to peace on a global scale?

Our most important task is to transform our consciousness so that violence is no longer an option for us in our personal lives, that understanding that a world of peace is possible only if we relate to each other as peaceful beings, one individual at a time.